What’s been going on here? Why so quiet? Where have I gone? Nowhere really. In the short cut, cheating format, my daily horoscope suggests:

There’s an old saying. “Better to keep your mouth shut and let people think you are a fool, than to open it and leave them in no doubt!” On that basis, discretion is surely the better part of valour now. Yet you feel that something quite ridiculous is taking place. You can’t just sit by and watch. You yearn to seize the reins and take control of a silly situation. That’s probably going too far. You really ought to wait until you are asked. But there is no law against saying something. Just be aware that if you do, even though you are right, you will probably be thought of as foolish.

of course, conversely, or further, my week should be:

Don’t just sit there, do something! You are starting to look like an artist in front of an easel on which a blank canvas has been carefully placed. There you are with brush in one hand, palette in the other, beret cocked jauntily across your head and smock draped moodily over your shoulders. You can stay there for all eternity. You can think up a thousand ideas – or a million. But, until you commit yourself to a brush stroke, you have nothing but theory to dwell on. The moment you make a mark though, you have something to build upon. Or even, perhaps, to criticise, remove or replace. Anything is better than nothing. And you, this week, are going to do something much, much better than “anything”. Summon your confidence and proceed.

Fine then, I should summon my confidence and proceed.
I nearly just threw away my pickle. Is that enough?

I am preparing to buy a car. I am considering many lease/buy options. I am considering many price ranges and brands. Is it called a brand? A model? Model sounds too sexy for anything outside of a corvette or other such actually sexy car. A Hummer may not look so sexy but the name it implies . . . However, what I really should hope for is what this guy got when he bought a car from a U.S. Marshal auction: 119 pounds of pot.
Some dialogue:

Jenny: From now on, you are going to have to be more available to me.
Self: I have other things to do. I can’t just be there in a flash.
Jenny: (angrily) What? What else do you have to do?
Self: I have showers to go to, a car to buy, stuff like that.
Jenny: Oh, what I mean is you just can’t be running off with your boyfriend all the time. You’re my bride’s maid. I need your help putting things together.
Self: Um, okay. . .
Jenny: You can’t just be there 2 or 3 nights a week. You need to make sure that I don’t need your help first.

The rest of this conversation involved me just agreeing with her to see my boyfriend on her schedule. I knew that being a bride’s maid had a heavy emphasis on maid.
Later that evening, since everyone is dying to throw up in his or her mouth:

Self: You shouldn’t put everything in the plastic container. Put it in the foil container so you can heat it up again. Else you’ll need to take out something over-proof.
Boy: That’s why I keep you around.
Self: Because I know you shouldn’t put plastic in the oven?
Boy: No, because you have it all thought through even if you aren’t going to be here. You aren’t like a regular girl.
Self: Um, what am I like?
Boy: I mean, you aren’t the girl equivalent of a bachelor, a bachelorette. You are more like a wife or a mother.
Self: What?!?
Boy: You cook, you clean, you sit on the couch and knit.
Self: Maybe I just had to coo and clean for myself for more years that you. Maybe I’ve been cooking dinner for my family since 12 and doing my laundry since 8.
Boy: Fine, if you prefer to word it that way.

Wednesday, June 4, 2003

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Today I was thinking about pride. Not just pride, but false pride. False pride commonly comes in the form of conceit of those things society values so much that mean essentially very little, such as money and beauty. False pride is probably the dominate form of pride. Real pride you should never have to swallow. Real pride should be too big to get down. When pride is attached to an instilled feeling self-praise, a feeling of worth attached to something that is intrinsically worthy, you should never be able to allow this to shrink to something that can be forced down. If you can swallow it, it wasn't much to begin with.
Wednesday, May 28, 2003

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I bought a monthly train ticket. I wrote my name and phone number on the blanks in the back and now have a ticket to get to Manhattan. I suppose this is also a ticket to get out of the city each day. But I won't dwell on that.

For the second morning in a row, I stood on an impossibly long line in the "quaint" train station. I was number 8 in line today; number 7 in line yesterday. Each day, in the 10 minute waiting time, the guy behind the plexiglass failed to serve the handful of people in front of me before the train that would deposit me in the city just at 9 am arrived. Yesterday, I left the line in a huff and paid too much to get to work. Today, I went from fourth in line to first when the train arrived, those in front of me cursing under their breath and rushing for the train without tickets. But I stayed to buy my monthly ticket. And got to work at my "normal" hour of some time before 10 am.

The guy was pretty rude, as most of the people had been pulling that over-privileged white attitude with him in regards to them being late and his ineptness. I kind of felt bad for him, but didn't really when he said "do you at least have 80 cents in cash?!?" since of course I was paying for my $4.10 ticket with 20 different forms of non-cash funds. (Actually, it was $146.80 and I only used 2 forms of payment.) I pushed up my glasses as he was piling my tickets and receipts together and straightened my back as he was pushing them through the semi-circle opening in the plexiglass. In my very best "I am a product of white privilege but do not find myself to be above train station hourly wagers and other such persons who hold lowly jobs I would be offended to take but don't really look down upon them, I swear" voice, I said, "Thank you," and shoved everything in my 3/4 length light tan rain coat while flipping my pony tail over my shoulder and walking out of the station. By then it was 8:35 am. I had already had enough of today. I went to the local coffee shop and ordered a latte, two shots of espresso.
(I actually bought a small orange juice. And my pony tail isn't long enough to flip)

As mentioned in yesterday's comment by a fellow co-suburbanite, our little semi-metro outpost is not too bad when beers are available and cigarettes can be smoked whilst drinking them. Regardless of the fact that you get carded and have to drive home since you didn't bother to bring your i.d. with you since you aren't in NYC any more and don't fear getting hit by a bus, shot or other such situations that would require trained medical workers to want to know who you are because you can't tell them due to some horrible injury or other such circumstances that made me bring my i.d. with me everywhere, even to do laundry. So there's beer and a security that the people I am with can vouch for my identity in case I am not able to do so myself due to severe inebriation or a traumatic accident (but they cannot vouch for my age, I still have to fetch my i.d. to drink a beer).
Wednesday, May 28, 2003

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Everything I owned had been packed onto a truck. Three guys had put everything I owned onto a truck and I quickly swept the bare hardwood floors. Saturday was an endless day that began with the doorbell ringing in Brooklyn at 9:30 am and ended sometime around 1 am watching Saturday Night Live on the pull-out bed of the boyfriend's apartment. By the time everything was put on a truck, I had packed plants, a bird and other such delicates into cars and opened closets and cabinets repeatedly to make sure nothing was being left behind. The movers showed up hours late but finished in the estimated 4 hours, almost to the dot. I wonder if the slower drive on the interstate was intentional to keep to job to 4 hours or if it was as fast as the truck packed with my belongings could go?

I hadn't the time to look around the vast empty rooms and reminisce. I hadn't the time to dwell on the past two years. There were three guys in a truck waiting to be led to New Jersey, working on the clock. I looked around quickly, shut off the lights and kept the windows slightly cracked and then left. And so fast, I was gone.

I spent most of the remainder of the holiday weekend unpacking. Rather, first I cleaned out what was left in the room that my younger sister vacated and then I unpacked. Or unpacked about 75% of the way. Boxes upon boxes of kitchen wares and unneeded furniture stand temporarily rejected in my parents' attic. There wasn't really much to unpack except for clothign and my endless amount of crafting supplies. I don't know if I have "come to terms" with living there, if the reality has settled in, or if I am such a well-adjusted person that there is not settling in to be done and I feel just fine knowing everytime I want to do somewhere, my parents will know. And every time I see my boyfriend, my parents will know. And every time I am in a foul mood and want to pout and make evil faces, my parents will know.

At work today, it feels exactly the same. Except I go home on the train now instead of the subway and I am not carrying a backpack with clothes to stay overnight as I usually am when visiting Jersey. There is no more visiting. There is no reason for me to be in this city past 7 pm any more, really. My life is across the river, supposedly.

When I said I was happy to move to Jersey a few weks ago, I meant it. But it was more like that deep gasp of air you take to psyche your self up before tearing a band-aid from your flesh.

Tuesday, May 27, 2003

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Jesse and I discovered last night that we read the same Paul Auster book last week while we were chatting on the phone. It was about some guy who lost his family and obsessively researches and writes about a silent film comedian. Most of my evening could easily have been the stumbles and mishaps of silent films. No sounds track is necessary, just the situations in them selves are hilarious.

I decided at 4:30, with people not getting me the pieces I need to do my job, my brain leaking out of my nose and my attitude bad, that I would leave work. I go into the elevator area and hit the button about a million times. I pace back and forth. I hate the elevators for taking at least 4 to 5 minutes to ever arrive. The door to the elevator area opens. My boss walks in. He sees me leaving early and I make no attempt to explain why, at 4:30, I am leaving work.

I walk from shop to shop in my neighborhood, looking desparate and pointing to stacks of empty boxes, just a few, maybe one from each store would do. All the puffy faced men shake there heads no and point me out of the store, unwilling but perfectly able to help, as all I am asking for the empty boxes. Store owners in my neighborhood are box hoarders.

I sit on my sofa smoking a cigarette, taking a break from dismantling my apartment. My nose begins to run so I place my cigarette in the make-shift ashtray / frog-shaped votive holder and stand up, needing to get to a tissue as soon as possible. I kick the huge and very full glass of apple juice I had placed on the floor near my feet. I kick it as it rolls from my living room to the hallway, leaving a 20 foot trail of apple juice before I upright the completely empty cup. I run to the kitchen to get about 1,000 pounds of paper towel and begin mopping up the spill, soaking up the part that got on the rug. After movng from trash-bin to paper towel holder to spill 3 or 4 times, I realize my cigarette is not longer in the "ash tray". Instead, it's burning a hole in my rug.

I drop assorted things on my unshoed feet. I crush my fingers under boxes. I walk from room to room trying to fill up empty liquor and beer boxes with my posessions. I begin to realize I haven't tapped and set aside a box in nearly an hour. I give up and go to bed.

More packing tonight. Wrapping glasses in newspaper and deciding if I should throw away the corn starch or bring it to my parents'. Folding clothes that I'll unfold in two days. At least today I'll have witnesses, an audience, to the stupid things I keep on doing these days.

Thursday, May 22, 2003

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I sneezed about 15 minutes ago, splattering about 30 to 40 pin-head sized droplets of blood across the left boob of my otherwise startling white button down shirt. Maybe as the spots fade to maroon, they aren't too conspicious. Maybe they never looked so bad. But I know there there. I know there is blood on my shirt and it honestly creeps me out.

I don't think I have, as of yet, woken up fully. I am still half asleep today which is a combination of tea in the afternoon, a quick nap a little too late at night and dramatically changing temperatures over the course of last night. I feel kind of stoned-like but not in a good way. Maybe my body is all bummed about having to pack tonight and letting go of Brooklyn. I wish I was in therapy just to come up with good bullshit about why I feel the way I do outside of lack of sleep and mild allergies.

Wednesday, May 21, 2003

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Things My Girlfriend and I Have Argued About
Margret: You haven't washed all the lettuce.
Mil: I've washed the bits I'm going to eat.
Margret: And left the rest for me to wash.
Mil: If you wash it all, it goes off quicker.
Margret: So, we'll eat it quicker, then.
Mil: I don't want to eat it quicker.
Margret: But I do.
Mil: Then wash it yourself if you're so bloody desperate to gorge on lettuce. What am I? Your official Lettuce Washer?
Margret: My last boyfriend was taller than you.

We are at that stage that our first fights must be forgiven. No, not must be forgiven. We are at the state when our first big fights lead to compromising we had not intended. No, we aren't even having big fights. We are at the stage that we want to continue dating more than we want to break up. There is one person who asks me to end it all, give me back my singlehood. The person who wants things that make peolpe throw up in their mouths kicks that other persons ass.

I walked nearly 6 and a half miles yesterday. Well, 6 and half miles in one straight stretch. This just makes me want to walk further than that some other time. I walked through Brooklyn, past stoop sales and yuppie children named Sage. I walked through downtown Brooklyn and up over the Brooklyn Bridge, finding myself looking down between the wooden planks at the river below. And at the crumbly line between the pedestrian and bike path, trying to contemplate how long the line had been painted over in the cracked and flecked off areas. I walked up through Tribeca, watching well-polished yuppies eating eggs and smoking cigarettes in outdoor cafes. I stopped walking only because I did not want to be accused of excess.

Tonight, I should really be packing up boxes and drawers. But Martha, Inc. is on NBC and I really think knitting while watching this would be most appropriate.

Monday, May 19, 2003

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Last night I had a dream about putting on white eyeliner. I wanted that white eyeliner look for whatever reason and carefully applied the skinniest line to my lids. I then blinked my eyes and looked in the mirror and thought I looked nice that way.

I also had a dream that the tree I bought my mother for Mother's Day snapped. It's a small tree, no more than 3 and a half feet tall and during the supposed nor'easter we are supposed to have this afternoon / evening the entire tree snapped off from its trunck, leaving the little stubby stump behind. It was very depressing to me, that the tree I lovingly picked out and planted was gone.

I cheated last night and slept on my side. I didn't do this on purpose but my body curled itself into its most favorite sleeping position which for the past 3 weeks causes my ribs to ache even more so. Funnily, I woke today feeling much better than normal. I stretched at my computer (it's great when the officemate takes off) while reading articles and emails. I actually am not whimpering inside.

I wish that someone would have told me two days ago that there was going to be a total eclipse of the moon last night. I would have been better prepared for the emotional nut I've been for the past few days. Maybe I am assigning cause where it is not due, but it's much easier to say that the lunar phases were messing with my emotions that to try to delve into all of the secrets and problems I am unaware of that are surfacing. In writing classes, teachers loved to use the word delve. I always hated it. It just looks stupid. Delve.
Friday, May 16, 2003

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From the archives:

I want salt air in my nose, seagulls crying overhead and dried sea water tingling my skin. I want a pony tail swishing agains my neck while I take long strides to keep up with the dog who is walking me. I want to have sex with a boy with blue eyes in the day light of a warm summer's bedroom. I want to catch up with an old friend while drinking sodas from straws. I want fire flies in an empty mayonaisse jar while eating Italian Ices on stone steps. I want somethings that is particularly surprising.
Friday, June 29, 2001

I've been pretty moody lately because I am impatient and the length of time that my costochondritis is taking to heal is frustrating me. I smoke between 4 and 7 cigarettes each day. I prefer the days I smoke 4 but realize that 7 is okay. I sleep very poorly. I have the need to burst out in tears but have yet to really. Leaving Brooklyn makes me sad to leave a place I love. I wouldn't mind getting into a screaming match where there are no hard feelings in the end. I have no short term memory and am easily distracted.

I have made a bitty baby strawberry hat and a fall-leaves colored funky hat to wear when I am back to school in the fall. I have learned to open myself and believe that trust is possible. I have stated my case. I have many boxes that need to be filled. I smoked 3 cigarettes already today.

I want to walk over the Brooklyn Bridge. I want to walk from my house to Central Park. Brunch, with the turkey and cranberry sandwich at Dizzy's in Park Slope is in order. Being teased and joked with by the Te-Amo guy when buying a soda at 3 o'clock inthe morning, mostly drunk after riding the subway home from Manhattan. I want to the satisfaction of paying $5 for a movie that I don't like on a Tuesday or Thursday night.

I am acting as if I am moving to Mars not New Jersey. I forget that each day I will still be crossing the Hudson River, with a monthly pass so that a weekend wandering is still possible without incuring train fare. I want what is happening in my life next but I will miss this place. I will miss being here as my rightful place to be.
Thursday, May 15, 2003

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The patch does not work for me. Instead, over the past week, I've worked on severely limiting my cigarette intake under the theory that I should be free of not just the habit but the chemical dependence as well. I do well in this area, depriving myself of cigarettes for what I would have once found to be insane lengths of time. The days on end that a pack lasted me was mind-boggling. But I became so anxiety ridden, nervous and had frequent bouts of "oh my god, I'm dying" instances. I battle my desires to smoke but sometimes give that anxious and crazy person in my head a cigarette to keep her quiet even when the rational person who wants to quit is fighting that urge. In sum, I smoke as little as I possibly can without going insane. About 5 or so a day. I could possibly limit myself more in the evening hours, but don't care to.

When the rain comes in the early spring, wetting the tree trunks black against the fragile, light fresh leaves, the contrast is striking to me. The leaves have yet to become sugar-fattened by the sun and photosynthesis, not waxy but thin and brillantly green. The trunks are dark and strong. The petals and blossoms and other such pollen filled growths are full and lush, almost seeming too heavy for the branches. Memories of how snow weighed down the branches compared to the pink and white blossoms cause me to blink once, sometimes twice. And when the rain comes, the petals and pollen-things falls to the ground, making a mushy brown mess, sticking firmly to window shields as the trees shed and fill my eyes with allergens.

Springtime is so full of life that I could not help but cry while driving around. The pill is partially to blame as my hold on my emotions is practically non-existant. I drove far out, to where there are horses standing by the road to a tree farm and picked out a red lace-leaf maple for my mother. Later in the afternooon it was delivered under the strangest of weather conditions. It was light out, yet foggy. It was warm, but the wind blew cold lashing rain against my face. We planted the tree then, because I wanted to dig in dirt. We dug a deep hole, hitting rock while I hoped we wouldn't uncover the skeletons of any of the small caged animals I kept as pets in my youth. I re-arranged the garden stautes around the new tree, fascinated and grossed out by the bugs that lived under their bases, picking things up with the shovel to allow my father to inspect them.

When the tree was firmly placed in the yard, I began cooking dinner. While everyone tells me I eat "weird" things and I am not a chemist so I should be careful about al the spices and stuff I am combining, no meat was left after the meal. Little vegetables remained and everyone lingered at the table, too full to move once they'd pushed their plates away.
p.s. Edited out the word "boughs" and replaced it with branches above.
p.p.s. I edited out any detail that could make anyone throw up in their mouths.

Monday, May 12, 2003

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The first thing that caught my attention when I entered the subway yesterday morning was the t-shirt "Movies for the Blind." It was printed on a black shirt in that waxy iron-on material popular in the early-80s that wafted a distinct scent of mildly burnt plastic until it dried up and crackled after many washings. The guy wearing this shirt had a closely cropped buzz cut, thick bushy eyebrows, sweat-suit style paints and was nodding off with his arms across his chest. "Movies for the Blind" was printed in the 1950s pulp-fiction type font. I assumed it was one of those kitschy things.

Two stops later, after I'd finished contemplating his shirt, a man dressed in a spring-weight gray wool pinstriped suit with black loafers with tassels entered the train. Predominately, he also had a cane. Not any cane, but the cane that blind people sweep in endless crescents in front of themselves. A guy with the most proximate seat to the door that the blind man had entered tapped the blind man's arm as he slid over one seat, giving his vacated spot to the blind man.

The blind man was now sitting directly across the car from the young man in the "Movies for the Blind" t-shirt. The young man opened his eyes and looked at the blind man. He gathered his arms closer across himself, eying the blind man and slowly covering the "Movies for the Blind" on the t-shirt as if to hide it from the blind man or maybe from the eyes of fellow seeing passengers.

I tried to untangle the juxapositioning of the blind man across the car from the "Movies for the Blind" guy until both departed at Jay Street. I tried to determine if it was ironic or embarrassing. But eventually both departed and I began to read my book, thoughts still lingering at the back of my head. Maybe they went off together. Maybe to watch some movies.

Thursday, May 8, 2003

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